A subscriber asked me: How do you view Marxism, and why does it work in China? I’ll address it from several angles:

First, Marxism itself is also a theory produced under limited historical conditions.
Marxism emerged in the early 19th-century European industrial capitalism. It aimed to resolve the contradictions between capital and labor at the time. If you take Marxism from a tool for social analysis and turn it into an ideology that can’t be challenged, it will lose the “critical spirit” that Marxism originally emphasized.
Because one of Marx’s most core ideas is, in fact, to criticize reality, not to build an unchallengeable new system. When a theory further integrates with politics, institutions, and power structures to form a complete new system, the problem is no longer only whether the theory itself is correct, but whether the system still has the ability for continuous self-critique and self-correction.

Second, China’s actual functioning institutions cannot be simply understood as the result of Marxism; they are the outcome of historical path dependence, traditional governance models, and modern political concepts working together.
China’s political tradition of thousands of years is, in essence, a long-term centralized system. Whether in feudal dynasties or modern state governance, there are some shared features: emphasis on central authority; emphasis on unified administration; emphasis on the state’s organizational capacity; and emphasis on a top-down governance framework.
Therefore, China’s acceptance and development of Marxism is not only because of Marxism’s theory itself, but also because some parts within it that emphasize organization, collective goals, and the state’s capacity for mobilization align to some extent with China’s long-formed governance tradition.
In other words, the formation of China’s system is not entirely about “Marxism shaping China.” It can also be understood as: China selectively absorbed the parts of Marxism that fit its own historical structure, and integrated them into its existing logic of state governance.
But there is also a problem here: historical path dependence can be both an advantage and a constraint. A centralized model is very suitable for solving: large-scale resource mobilization; maintaining social order; and executing long-term strategy. But it may also lead to: distortion in the process of information flowing upward from the grassroots; risks of excessive concentration of power; and insufficient space for spontaneous social innovation.
Because the advantage of a highly organized system lies in “coordination,” but innovation often comes from “decentralized exploration.” So the real issue is not whether centralization is efficient; it is: can a governance model formed over thousands of years adapt to modern society’s demands for innovation, openness, and diversity?

Third, the so-called “China’s system works,” needs to distinguish from whose perspective we’re looking.
If we look from the angle of national competition and governance efficiency, this model does have advantages: it can concentrate resources; drive large-scale goals; and maintain policy continuity. But if we look from the perspectives of individuals and society, the picture is different. A highly organized system often means stronger unity, but it can also lead to reduced individual space and reduced social spontaneity.
Because many forms of social innovation come from: non-planned exploration; individual trial and error; competition among different viewpoints; and bottom-up creativity. Therefore, the biggest challenge for a system is not “whether it can achieve its goals,” but: as society becomes more and more complex, whether it allows enough uncertainty to exist.